Blair Howard

Shadows from the past. A brutal murder. This time it’s personal. It takes only one phone call to turn Harry Starke into a monster. It begins when Harry’s kid brother is brutally murdered, his body thrown into the murky waters of the Tennessee River. That alone would be enough to set Harry on...

Maggie Hart, a student at UTC, was abducted on Labor Day. Her body was found five days later on the RiverPark. She’d been strangled. She wasn’t the first, nor would she be the last. Harry Starke, recovering from a near-death experience, is dragged reluctantly into an investigation that...

What would you do if someone murdered your best friend and mentor? Private investigator Harry Starke owes his career to Frank Callahan, the tough-as-nails detective who trained him as a young cop. But when Frank is found brutally murdered in his own home, Harry can’t let it go. The crime scene...

Two murders. A library. A century of secrets. When prominent Chattanooga businessman Augustus Aldridge III is found dead in his mansion’s library, Lt. Kate Gazzara discovers something chilling: nearly a century earlier, a young woman named Emily Caldwell was murdered in that same room. The...

Twenty-one years ago, Harry Starke, on his first case as lead detective made a mistake, a mistake that sent an innocent man to prison for life. Now, haunted by the past, and with new evidence, he must finish what he started and find the real killer. A killer that will do anything to hide the...

In 1982, ten-year-old Emma Jacobs disappeared while on her way home from school. Almost four decades later the case file lands on Kate Gazzara’s desk. A cursory review of the case quickly turns into a personal nightmare for her team member, Detective Anne Robar. Haunted by vague, shadowy...

“Stand absolutely still, Amanda,” she read, “and you won’t get hurt.” Two seconds later a bullet from a sniper’s rifle shattered the driver’s side window of her Lexus SUV. That’s how it began, early on a Friday morning when Amanda, Harry’s wife, found the note tucked under her...

A puzzling death, two dead lawyers, and another close call for Kate. When prominent defense attorney Madison Lombardi drops dead on the street outside her office of a perceived heart attack, no one pays much attention . . . Except for her husband. When a second attorney, her law partner, drops...

Mystery woman, Morrigan Doyle, is in prison. Finn Doyle, her son, has ties to the Irish mob in New York. He became acquainted with Harry Starke when Harry was investigating his mother’s billion-dollar Ponzi scheme. But Finn has an agenda of his own and wants to hire Harry to “find a friend...

The saga continues with three more spell-binding Kate Gazzara murder case files! Book 13: Feathers Book 14: Samson Book 15: Indigo Greed, revenge, jealousy, money, love, and hate are all motives for murder and all in a day’s work for Lt. Kate Gazzara. If you love whodunits, police procedurals...

Kingsley Lynch fell to her death from a seven-story, downtown rooftop garden. Was it an accident, suicide, or was she pushed? The two detectives assigned to the case decided she jumped. Her husband, an influential city councilor disagrees, and six weeks later Kate Gazzara is assigned to...

Harry, Kate, and Samson together again. What happened to Gavin Glassdon? A missing person, two murders, an enigmatic Irishman, and a billion-dollar Ponzi scheme bring Harry Starke, Captain Kate Gazzara and her trusty K9 companion, Samson, together again in a bewildering detective thriller that...

On a balmy afternoon in May 2002, wealthy stockbroker Peter Nicholson was turkey hunting with three friends in Prentice Cooper State Forest when he tripped, fell on his shotgun, and accidentally shot himself … dead, but did he? Fifteen years later, as a last resort, Nicholson’s mother asks...

Murder in Hilden Heights? Was Hattie Baker the victim of a serial killer? On a balmy, late summer morning in Hilden Heights, Hattie Baker is found dead in her pool, and she wasn’t the first. A socialite and successful business owner, Hattie was an excellent swimmer. Even so, her death was...

“There are four basic reasons why someone commits murder. The first and most powerful is love. The second—equally powerful—is hate. Almost equally compelling is revenge. The fourth is profit. Money. When one family member kills another, one or more of them is almost always the motive, and...

One dark Friday evening in October, Dillon Harper and Brian McDaniel went out to drink a few beers and smoke a little marijuana. Their bodies were found hours later on the railroad tracks north of town. They’d both been struck by the midnight train. The autopsies revealed copious amounts of...

Harry Starke loves a cold case, but this one is really cold, more than a hundred years cold. Family Matters is a tale that takes place on the lonely coast of Maine, where Amanda, a true believer in the paranormal, has inherited—you guessed it—a haunted house. At least that’s what the...

Angela Hartwell was dead, strangled, with not a mark on her. When a well-known local socialite’s body is found during a round of golf with his father, Harry Starke suddenly finds himself embroiled in what quickly becomes a very thorny murder investigation. Who killed Angela Hartwell and why?...

Emily Johnston is GONE. She’s been GONE for more than a week. She’s also the daughter of Harry Starke’s one-time boss and nemesis, Chattanooga Police Chief Wesley Johnston. Harry and Chief Johnston haven’t seen eye-to-eye in a long time, but when Johnston needs help, he knows there’s...

Were they simply victims of a tragic accident, or was it something more sinister? In a small but exclusive subdivision of Chattanooga, a devastating house fire leaves a family of five in ruins. The blaze claimed two victims leaving behind a shattered community and a lot of unanswered questions...